"It is all very singular," said the doctor, knitting his brows. "Of course we would like to get out of here, but as to seeking the assistance of a smuggler——"
"I'd as soon go out under his escort as that of any one else," laughed Storms, "although we might get in trouble afterward if a government vessel happened to see us in company with smugglers. Well, I guess it won't be long now before the relief steamer comes, but——"
"But they may not know the way in, and we are as badly off as before," finished the doctor. "I don't see that we have advanced any, except, perhaps, to let people know where we are."
"And you think there is little satisfaction in that?" with a grin. "We might be worse off, however, so I guess we had better wait and trust to good luck. Clever game, that of Jack's, wasn't it, stealing the fellow's despatches?"
"Why, yes, clever in a way," admitted the doctor, glaring at the captain through his big black-rimmed glasses, "but does it not savor somewhat of—h'm—of deception? Pretending to be one person when he was another, and quite a different one, by the way?"
"But he did not pretend to be anybody. He simply flashed a message, and if that fellow outside took him for another person it was not Mr. Sheldon's fault. All is fair in love and war, you know."
"H'm! so I have heard, but as I have been in neither I cannot say whether it is so or not. However, I am not accusing you, Sheldon, you understand? I suppose, under the circumstances, that what you did was perfectly justifiable. At any rate, we shall not have to wait for this person to come and take us out. But where was the person to whom he was sending signals? You did not see him, Captain?"
"No, indeed, and I wonder that my man on deck did not see them. Asleep, I'll warrant. That means loss of shore liberty to him for some time. The other fellow was not here, of course. How could he get in?"
"I believe there is a way, sir," spoke up Jack, "and that this place is used as a retreat for smugglers. If not just here, then some part of the island. How about the calf we saw? I thought at the time that there were people here, but did not think of smugglers."
"Why, I guess you've been reading about Captain Kidd and Blackbeard and those old pirates, and have got your head full of secret lairs and all that sort of stuff."